News: Photovoltaics
9 September 2024
First Solar issues 2024 Sustainability Report
According to its 2024 Sustainability Report, cadmium telluride (CdTe) thin-film photovoltaic (PV) module maker First Solar Inc of Tempe, AZ, USA has established new industry benchmarks including verifiable leadership in ultra-low-carbon solar technology, high-value recycling, respect for human rights, and transparent reporting. First Solar is the largest solar manufacturer in the Western Hemisphere and the world’s largest high-value solar panel recycler.
“As we celebrate 25 years of First Solar in 2024, we also celebrate 25 years of an unwavering commitment to the principles of Responsible Solar, which embodies sustainability, improves people's lives, has zero tolerance for human rights abuses, and meaningfully supports the fight against climate change,” says CEO Mark Widmar. “The results of building our company on a principled foundation are apparent from our verifiable leadership in environmental and social performance and reporting,” he adds. “The third-party validated benchmarks that confirm our leadership are essential to further differentiate ourselves from the competition while challenging the industry to do better.”
First Solar says that its manufacturing process allows it to transform a sheet of glass into ready-to-ship thin-film solar panels in about 4 hours. Its CdTe is claimed to lead the industry in environmental performance and competitiveness, allowing the firm to produce solar panels with a carbon footprint up to four times lower than those utilizing crystalline silicon cells made from Chinese polysilicon, even if assembled into panels in the USA. The technology was recently validated when First Solar’s Series 6 Plus and Series 7 TR1 became the world’s first solar panels to achieve an EPEAT Climate+ designation by meeting the ultra-low-carbon threshold of ≤400kg CO2e/kWp, enabling greater avoided emissions across their lifetime.
“As the Clean Energy Buyers Institute warned, if the solar manufacturing industry continues its business-as-usual approach by relying on cheap, subsidized coal electricity to produce polysilicon, it runs the risk of overtaking aluminium production in carbon intensity,” says First Solar’s chief product officer Pat Buehler. “We must act now to change course by actively reducing the carbon footprint of solar technologies while also investing in high-value recycling that addresses the end-of-life management of decommissioned solar panels in a sustainable manner. Our industry must embody sustainability, not simply pay lip service to it.”
First Solar operates high-value recycling facilities in the USA, Germany, India, Malaysia and Vietnam, representing 88,000 metric tons of nameplate annual recycling capacity at the end of 2023, capable of recycling about 2.6 million modules per year. The firm established the industry’s first global recycling program in 2005 and has recycled nearly 400,000 metric tons of PV modules to date, more than any other PV recycler or PV recycling program, it is reckoned. In 2023, First Solar’s high-value module recycling program recorded an average global material recovery rate of 95%, including glass, aluminium, steel, laminate and semiconductor material.
“We continue to reinforce that our industry’s work in driving the energy transition and fighting climate change does not serve as a credit against its social and human rights responsibilities,” says Samantha Sloan, VP of global policy, sustainability & marketing. “And we lead by example, operating one of the world’s most tightly controlled and traceable solar supply chains and the industry’s only manufacturing footprint to have completed social audits by a credible third party.”
First Solar says that it remains the only major solar manufacturer to have not just conducted independent third-party, on-site social audits across its global manufacturing footprint in 2023 but also to have achieved the highest possible rating. The audits conducted under the Responsible Business Alliance’s (RBA) Validated Assessment Program (VAP) awarded the company’s operational facilities in the USA, Vietnam and Malaysia with platinum status as of December 2023. Not reliant on Chinese crystalline silicon supply chains, First Solar does not source materials from Xinjiang, China.
The Business and Human Rights Resource Centre commented in its 2023 Renewable Energy Human Rights Benchmark report that the solar panel manufacturing industry lags “significantly on human rights commitments and practices.” However, it also highlighted First Solar as being one of only two companies of the six evaluated major solar manufacturers to have a strong human rights commitment in place. First Solar outperformed the other five companies assessed in the Benchmark report.
Since the start of this decade, First Solar has embarked on a $4.1bn manufacturing expansion strategy that has seen it grow from about 6GW operational in 2020 to over 16GW global nameplate capacity at the end of 2023. The firm currently operates manufacturing facilities in the USA, India, Malaysia and Vietnam. Two factories, one in Alabama (expected to be commissioned in second-half 2024) and the other in Louisiana (to come online in second-half 2025) are projected to take the company’s global footprint to over 25GW of annual nameplate capacity in 2026. Additionally, the firm is investing about half a billion dollars in R&D infrastructure in Ohio, including the Jim Nolan Center for Solar Innovation, which was commissioned earlier this year.
First Solar becomes solar industry’s first EPEAT Climate+ Champion
First Solar issues 2023 Sustainability Report unveiling onsite third-party social audits
